A Different Kind of Hell
by mcatB
Summary: A different kind of torture. What would make Dean break?
1. Polkas

A Different Kind of Hell 

_"Dad? It's... It's Sam. Dad, I need your help. It's Dean… Dad, I don't know what to do."_

John Winchester listened to the voicemail one more time before putting his cell phone away. The message was from three days earlier. There were four others, similar to that one, left on successive days. John cursed the damn poltergeist for taking up his time, for being a pickpocket and stealing is phone, knife, penlight and other small items before he'd had the chance to banish it. For keeping him from his boys.

He hit the speed dial and waited for Sam to answer.

"_Dad?"_

_God,_ he cried to himself. Sam had only said one word, yet it spoke volumes, his fear and weariness shouting out to him, begging for his help.

"Sammy, I'm sorry, I just got the messages. What happened? How's Dean?"

_"He's…he's just empty. Won't eat, won't speak… he's just staring into space. It's like he's not even here, Dad. I don't know what to do."_

"Where are you, Sam?"

_"Charlotte. North Carolina."_

"I can be there in a few hours. I'm in Virginia now. What happened?"

"_God, Dad. It was awful. Some witch got a hold of him. She had him locked up. I couldn't get to him…"_ Sam's voice was breaking. John practically heard the tears falling. _"She tortured him, Dad."_

"What did she do?" he asked, needing, yet not wanting to know."

Sam told him all the horrible details, trying not to cry as he did so.

John gave him specific instructions and ended their conversation with, "I'm coming, Sammy."

00000

Sam dropped his phone onto the bed beside him. He looked across the room, at the other bed, at Dean. He was just lying there, silently staring at the ceiling, or wherever his head happened to turn, when gravity gave in, when Sam moved him… He hadn't spoken a word nor made a sound since Sam had rescued him from the evil woman's clutches. Sam squeezed his eyes closed in frustration and anger. He wished he could kill her for what she'd done to Dean.

He got up and moved to Dean's side, sitting gently on the bed. He reached over and put a Black Sabbath tape into the motel's combination clock/radio/cassette player.

"Dean? Dean, can you hear me?" he called, lightly tapping his brother's cheek. "Come on, Jerk, I know you're in there." He sighed again. "If you don't start talking to me soon, I'll be forced to watch Oprah, just to pass the time. You wouldn't want that to happen, now would you?" Still no reaction.

He reached for the bottle of water on the nightstand. Gently lifting Dean's head and shoulders with one arm, he poured a small amount of the liquid into Dean's slack mouth and quickly put the bottle down. He got Dean's mouth closed before most of the water could dribble out and managed to help his brother swallow the rest. Sam did this several more times, managing to get about half the bottle into his brother.

While he was very worried about what that witch had done to Dean's mental well being, he was also starting to worry about his brother's physical well being. And while Sam had been able to rescue Dean, and had been caring for his needs for three days, there were still the two days he'd spent in the witch's clutches, where he was sure she didn't bother to give him any food or water. He was already coming close to being dehydrated. Lack of food wouldn't be too far behind on the list of ailments.

"Come on, Dean. You're stronger than this. You've got to come back to us. You can't let the bitch win!"

When Sam still received no reply, but only a vacant stare from Dean, he got up and began pacing the small motel room.

The memory of his brother's screaming, begging, calling out to him haunted Sam. He'd seen her latch onto Dean, drag him into her house, both of them powerless to stop her once she was on her own property. She'd thrown up some sort of force field, keeping her and Dean inside and him out. Nothing penetrated it – not bullets, rock salt, or knives – not even the Impala. For six hours straight he'd tried to get in. For six hours straight, he'd had to listen to Dean's voice become hoarse and hoarser and quiet and quieter.

Sam was finally forced to retreat, then, calling out to Dean, telling him to be brave and to resist her torture, as he did so.

It was two days later that he got the breakthrough – at the town's library – the answer to his prayers. He'd found out that the old woman was one of the town's founders, and, more importantly, that she had a criminal history – she'd been arrested in her youth.

Her whole beef against Dean, why she'd singled him out, was that she believed him to be a young criminal, someone who needed to be made into a model citizen. It was when Sam threw her own history at her, showed her that she was no better than anyone else, let alone, Dean, that her spell, her force field, was broken. But the damage to Dean had already been done.

There was nothing Sam could do then, but to gather up his listless, near lifeless, brother, and go.

Sam looked at his watch. He wondered when their father would arrive. Soon, he hoped. He didn't know what else to do for Dean. He leaned against the wall and slowly slid down to the floor.

00000

True to his word, John arrived four hours later. He'd called Sam again when he'd gotten to Charlotte's city limits and got directions to the motel. Fifteen minutes after that, duffle bag full of supplies on his back, he knocked on the door.

"Dad!" Sam greeted him, hugging him tightly.

"Oh, Sammy. I'm sorry I couldn't get here sooner," he replied, hugging back. "How is he?"

"The same."

John walked into the room and over to Dean.

"Dean? Come on, Son. Time to wake up," he called. He adjusted the volume of the cassette player, which was now playing an AC/DC tape.

"I've tried Sabbath, AC/DC, Metallica… Nothing's worked," Sam told him.

"We're just going to have to give it some time, Sam," John replied, gently brushing his fingers through his older son's hair. "She had him for two days straight."

"It was awful, Dad," Sam said, nodding in agreement. "For two days straight she forced him to watch and listen to reruns of the Lawrence Welk show. She took away his leather jacket and forced him into a powder blue tux, with ruffles!" he cried, his body shuddering as he recalled the sight of his brother when he rescued him.

Even John shuddered at the description.

"Get his coat and put it on him. Let him smell the leather," John suggested. "And I've got some Alice Cooper in the truck. We'll get him back, Sammy. Trust me."

Sam nodded again.

00000

Two hours later, in the middle of Alice Cooper's "Welcome to My Nightmare" album, Dean let out a groan as he moved his head back and forth.

"No more bubbles. Please. No more bubbles," he murmured. "I'll kick your polka dotted ass."

Sam and John smiled. Dean was back.


	2. Divas

A/N: For those that actually asked for more…and for November's Guest, especially.

"Oh, man," Dean sighed, flopping back onto the motel room's double bed. He let out a deep, loud sigh. "I swear, if we have to deal with one more friggin' teenager taking his date through a haunted house who doesn't listen when the big bad ghost says, "Get out!" I'll shoot him and the ghost, both!"

Sam dropped down onto the other bed and nodded his head. "Yeah, you'd think after seeing so many scary movies, they might think twice."

"That's just it. Nobody believes that shit'll ever happen to them. Damn."

"I'm gonna grab a shower," Sam said, rising and heading for the bathroom.

Dean nodded and sat up on the bed. He reached for the television remote and turned the set on, pushing the channel button before the first channel even appeared.

00000

Sam relaxed under the hot spray. The haunted house gig hadn't been all that bad – the worst part was, indeed, getting the teenagers to listen to them and actually get out of the house. The ghost wasn't so bad. Just an old man that wanted his privacy. Even if he was dead…

He was thankful for the easy job, though. It was the first one they'd been on since Dean's kidnapping and subsequent torture. He still shuddered uncontrollably when he thought of what his brother had been put through. _The woman was pure evil._ But what was worse was that despite being a witch, she was still human, too. They couldn't just go to her house and kill her; prevent anyone else from succumbing to her torture.

He smiled then, and recalled his and his Dad's midnight raid to her house to steal all of her homemade videotapes of the Lawrence Welk show. They'd made a bonfire and let Dean light it. It was the best that they could do, under the circumstances.

Sam finished his shower and dried off. He'd just gotten his boxers and jeans on when he heard Dean's scream.

"Sammy!"

Sam rushed from the bathroom, grabbing his shotgun from his duffel bag along the way, and searching the room for bad guys. "Dean?" he called, seeing the empty bed.

When he caught sight of his brother lying on the floor between the two beds, he rushed over. "Dean? Dean, what's wrong?" he called.

Dean was curled up in a ball on the floor, his arms and hands covering his eyes and ears, rocking back and forth, mumbling, "Makeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstopmakeitstop," over and over.

Sam didn't know what had happened, what had caused Dean to react this way. He looked around the room, and saw no threat. But then the awful sounds penetrated his senses. He looked at the television and saw the source of his brother's terror and torture.

"Oh, God!" he cried.

He frantically searched for the remote, but couldn't find it. Dean's keening wails became louder. "MAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOPMAKEITSTOP!" Finally, Sam just aimed the shotgun at the television set and pulled the trigger. The resulting explosion sent glass and plastic everywhere in the room.

When the dust settled, and silence reigned once more, Sam gently pulled at Dean's arms, pulling them away from his head. "Dean? Come on, Dean. It's safe now. You're all right," he called.

"She's gone?" Dean asked, his voice quiet.

"Yeah, she's gone. I blew her away," Sam replied with a smile.

"It was horrible, Sam," Dean rasped. "Sacrilegious, even."

"I know, Dean. I know," Sam agreed, shaking his head. "Whoever it was that decided to let Celine Dion sing "You Shook Me All Night Long," should be shot."

"AC/DC should sue."


	3. Elevator Music

Chapter Three

"What've we got this time, Sammy?" Dean asked, crumbs spraying from around the bagel in his mouth.

Sam gave him a dirty look for his rudeness. "Anybody ever tell you not to talk with your mouthful?"

"Not lately."

Sam rolled his eyes before turning his laptop around to face Dean. "Bobby sent me an email. His cousin thinks there's a ghost haunting a department store in Scranton," he said. "Three employees have died in the past year."

"Why do they think it's haunted? How'd they die?" Dean asked, after making sure Sam saw him take another bite of his bagel.

"The deaths were attributed to heart attacks," Sam pointed out, motioning to the screen.

"Yeeeeaaaah…"

"They were all healthy, _young_ employees. No previous history of health problems. Yet, three in one year? At the same place?"

"Okay," Dean nodded. He closed his eyes for a moment, hard memories coming back to him. "Think we got ourselves another reaper situation?"

"That's what we need to find out."

00000

Several hours later, driving to the sounds of Metallica, had the brothers arriving at _Boscov's,_ a fairly large department store in the heart of Scranton, Pennsylvania. Dean parked the Impala in the store's parking lot, a fair distance from the store, wary of his baby being dinged by other cars in the lot.

They entered the main entrance of the store and looked around. It was a fairly crowded for a weeknight, Sam thought. They had already talked about their best approach for getting information about what had been happening.

Sam pointed to a pretty female sales associate in the Juniors department. "Maybe she can help us."

"Only if she can change the radio station," Dean muttered. "Damn! Moldy Oldies," he added with a shudder, hearing something by the Mamas and the Papas.

Sam was immediately concerned for his brother. "Dean? You okay?" he asked, thinking back once again to Dean's torture at the hands of the witch in Charlotte.

"I'm fine, Sammy. See?" he said, holding out his hands. "Steady as can be."

They arrived at the sales counter and turned their attention to the woman, whose nametag read, "Nicole."

"Hi," Dean greeted her, turning on the charm. "We're hoping you could help us."

"Let me guess," Nicole replied flatly. "You're looking for gifts for your girlfriends."

Sam looked at Dean and shrugged. That _had_ been the line they were going to use.

"He is," Dean said, pointing to Sam. "I don't have a girlfriend. I'm still available," he added, giving her a wink.

Sam tried not to roll his eyes.

"Actually," Sam cut in, "we're hoping you could tell us about the ghost. We heard it killed some people here."

It was Dean's turn to roll his eyes. Sam was just no fun. Always going straight to business. But he had to hand it to his brother, most of the time honesty worked. Just like now.

The woman shuddered. "It's really creepy, you know?" she told them. "I'm thinking of quitting."

"What's it been doing? How did it kill those people?" Sam asked, keeping control of the conversation.

Nicole looked around before whispering, "They were all scared to death." When Sam and Dean gave her only looks of confusion, she elaborated, "It's true. Daniel was afraid of heights. They found him on the catwalk in the warehouse. Wendy was afraid of water – she couldn't swim. They found her in one of the kiddie pools outside. And Suzy was claustrophobic. They found her in one of the changing rooms."

Sam looked at Dean, who raised an eyebrow in response.

"Has there ever been a problem before this year?" Sam asked.

"Any idea who the ghost is?" Dean asked.

"Joe Sternman."

The brothers turned around to see who had joined their conversation. The store manager, whose nametag read, "Jerry," stood before them.

"Joe Sternman?" Dean questioned.

"You're Bobby's friends, right?" Jerry asked.

"Sam," Sam said, introducing himself and holding out his hand.

Jerry shook it and turned to Dean. "So you must be Dean," he surmised. Dean nodded and shook his hand as well. "Joe was a disgruntled employee. He always complained about being worked too hard. And, in the end, maybe he was," Jerry went on.

"How's that?" Sam asked.

"He had a heart attack on the job," Jerry replied with a shrug.

"So how does he fit in with the other three?" Dean asked.

"Wendy was his supervisor. She was always asking him to do a little more work."

"And Daniel and Suzy?"

"The same."

"So this Joe guy died from a heart attack on the job and is now seeking revenge," Dean reasoned.

"Joe's not dead," Nicole corrected them.

"He's not?" Sam asked, looking at Dean with a quizzical look on his face.

"No," Jerry replied.

"Oo-kay," Dean began. "So he's not a ghost. Why do you think he's haunting the place, which, by the way, is what ghosts, as in dead people, do?"

"He said he cursed the place," Jerry replied. "Said that this place tried to kill him, so he's exacting revenge."

"So it's a curse," Sam surmised, letting out a sigh. He hated curses.

"Where was Joe when he had his heart attack?" Dean asked.

"Up in Sporting Goods," Nicole replied. "Why?"

"No reason," Sam cut in. They didn't need to let this Nicole girl know what and who they really were.

Turning to Jerry, Dean asked, "Mind if we look around a bit?"

"No, go right ahead," Jerry replied.

"We've got, what, about half an hour until closing?" Sam asked. When Jerry nodded, Sam looked to Dean. "You check the place out. I'm gonna talk to Jerry and Nicole some more and then get a few things from the car."

Dean made a quick look between Sam and Nicole, gave Sam a wink, and headed off toward the lingerie department.

Sam turned back to Jerry, took him a few steps away from Nicole and quietly said, "It would be best if we handled this after hours; without too many witnesses, if you know what I mean."

Jerry nodded in agreement, but he had a worried look on his face.

00000

Dean strolled through the lingerie department, occasionally reaching out to feel the silk and lace undergarments he passed, smiling widely when a leopard print teddy caught his eye.

When the elderly sales clerk started giving him the eye, though, he sighed loudly and decided to head for the Sporting Goods department, instead.

Reading the store directory next to the elevator, Dean saw that he needed to head up to the fourth floor. Shortly after he pushed the call button, the doors slid open and Dean entered. Dean pushed the button for the fourth floor and as soon as the doors closed, he grimaced.

"Damn music is even louder in here," he groused. "Shoulda taken the stairs."

No sooner were the words out of Dean's mouth did the elevator shut down – all movement stopped, the lights went out, and, unfortunately for Dean, the music got louder.

"Fuck!" he swore, pulling out his cell phone.

The light from the small screen was not bright enough to light up the elevator car, but it did reassure Dean somewhat. He dialed Sam's number and paced while he waited for his brother to answer.

"_Dean?"_

"Sam, I'm stuck in the elevator," he said immediately, not giving Sam a chance to say anything more. "Is the rest of the store without power, too?"

"_No, Dean. Just you. Hang on, we'll get you out of there,"_ Sam told him. The song on the elevator changed and Sam heard the words, "Hey Mister Tambourine Man," being sung. He heard Dean let out a groan, and only had to say, _"Dean…"_ to let Dean know he heard what was happening, what his brother was going to go through.

"Just hurry, Sammy," Dean replied, and closed his phone. He didn't want Sam hear him punch and kick the elevator car's walls and door.

00000

"Your brother have a thing about elevators?" Jerry asked as he led Sam through the store and toward the elevator.

"No. Elevator _music_," Sam replied flatly.

00000

Dean continued his pacing around the small elevator, fingers in his ears, humming Metallica's _Die, Die My Darling_ as loudly as he could to try to block out the bad elevator music currently torturing him.

"I can't fucking believe this," he said aloud. "I can _not_ fucking believe this."

He tried prying the elevator doors open once more before kicking them again.

00000

When Sam and Jerry reached the elevator, Sam was horrified hear the racket going on. Between Dean's pounding on the doors and cursing at his failure to escape, and the loud easy listening music being forced upon them all, he knew it was imperative he get Dean out as soon as possible. He shuddered to think he'd have to "detox" Dean all over again, let alone worry about whatever physical injuries he was inflicting upon himself. He took out his cell phone and called his brother.

"Dean!" he yelled into the phone. "Dean, you've got to calm down!"

"_Sammy, you gotta shut this crap off!"_ Dean replied. _"I don't know how much I'm gonna be able to take!"_

Sam looked to Jerry. "Look, I can't really explain it, but is there any way to shut off the music, at least to the elevator?"

"I'll try," Jerry said with a shrug, adding, "but if he said the power is shut down to the elevator, then the speaker in there shouldn't be working, either."

00000

Half an hour later, as the third chorus of _The Morning After_ played, Dean found himself sitting on the floor of the elevator, knees up against his chest, fingers in his ears again, eyes shut tight, and rocking gently back and forth. "Come on, Sammy. Come on, Sammy. Come on, Sammy…" his current mantra.

He paid no attention to his bruised and bloodied hands and forearms, his swollen right knee or the broken toes within his sneakers.

"Come on, Sammy. Come on, Sammy. Come on, Sammy…"

00000

Sam and Jerry had been doing everything they possibly could to get the elevator opened up, the music shut off, or both. Even after actually cutting power to the elevator's speaker, they still heard the music playing inside.

Sam realized that there was only one way to end his brother's misery. He'd have to go about breaking the curse himself.

He pulled out his cell phone and dialed Dean's number.

"_Sammy?"_ came Dean's desperate, tired voice.

"Dean, just hang in, man. I'm gonna try and break the curse. Just a little while longer, okay?"

"_Hurry, Sammy,"_ Dean begged.

Sam was about to say more, when Dean suddenly screamed, _"NOOOOOOOOOO!"_

"Dean! Dean!" Sam shouted into his phone. "Dean!" But all he heard were the melodious sounds of a ukulele playing, and Don Ho's voice singing, _Tiny Bubbles._

00000

Sam cursed Dean for parking so far away from the store's entrance. Just once it would have been nice to park close by. But Sam had more important things to worry about, like actually removing a curse, to save his brother. He grabbed the small backpack filled with supplies they used for removing curses, his dad's journal and ran back to the store.

He headed right for the escalator, skipping half the steps as he made his way up to the fourth floor and the Sporting Goods department. Jerry was there waiting for him.

"It happened right over here," Jerry told him, pointing to the bowling ball aisle. "He'd been stocking the shelves."

Sam nodded and set out his supplies: candles, feathers, holy water, sage and his father's journal.

Jerry just stood back and watched and listened as Sam went through the ritual. It all just looked like some mumbo jumbo stuff kids played at during summer camp, like telling ghost stories around the campfire. He never really believed his cousin when he said he could help. But when the merchandise started flying off the shelves, and he had bowling balls heading his way, Jerry turned into a believer.

00000

As soon as the music stopped and the store was silent, Sam ran for the elevator and frantically began pushing the call button.

"Come on, come on," he quietly pled, pushing the buttons some more.

When the doors finally opened, Sam saw Dean's unconscious figure lying on the floor of the car. "Dean?" he called, fear that he'd come to late at the fore of his mind.

He reached down and felt Dean's neck for a pulse and was relieved to find it. Not taking any chances that the ritual he used to remove the curse would fail, or only be temporary, he grabbed his brother under his armpits and dragged him out of the elevator, laying him on floor outside it.

"Dean? Come on, Big Brother, time to wake up," he called gently, putting his hand on Dean's forehead.

"Sammy?" Dean whispered, slowly opening his eyes.

Sam smiled. "Hey," he greeted Dean, helping him to sit up and lean against the wall.

"So it's done?" Jerry asked, interrupting the brothers' reunion.

"Should be," Sam replied. "Unless Joe comes into the store again, he shouldn't be able to set another curse here."

"He gonna be okay? Never saw anybody react that way to music before," Jerry remarked, looking at Dean.

Sam looked at Dean and then at Jerry. Not finding the words to explain his brother's severe aversion to certain music, he just shrugged his shoulders and said, "Eventually."

"Oh, well," Jerry said. Obviously uncomfortable, he changed the subject and asked, "So what do I owe you boys, anyway?"

00000

Sam sat at the motel's desk, his laptop computer open in front of him. Behind him, on one of the beds, Dean slept quietly, the 'soothing' sounds of Black Sabbath playing quietly on the radio next to the bed. Sam looked at his brother and sighed. It had been a close one for his brother, once again.

After Jerry had asked about payment, Sam told him to wait a little bit – that he'd be back in the store in a few minutes. He'd proceeded to get Dean to the Impala, got some heavy metal playing on the car's cassette deck, and made sure none of Dean's injuries needed any immediate medical attention.

When he returned to the store, he told Jerry that, honestly, they usually didn't charge monetary fees for their services. But Jerry had insisted upon some sort of payment and suggested Sam go on a "shopping spree" in lieu of money. After a few seconds' thought, and knowing that Dean would go ballistic when he heard, Sam agreed.

On the bed Dean wasn't occupying was an assortment of clothing and camping equipment that he had picked out during his "shopping spree." Dean, upon seeing Sam leave the store with a couple of shopping carts, had just nodded.

Sam looked back at his computer and the small object hooked up to it. The first place he'd gone to in the store had been the music and electronics department. He picked out an MP3 player and was now downloading it with as much heavy metal as he could. Dean would never be without _his_ music again.

A/N: Thanks to November's Guest for the look-see. I wasn't sure if this chapter would fit - it was vastly different from the first two chapters - but then, I figured, you knew what was coming in this one...


End file.
